Lifestyle Change Means Nothing To Me

Of all the cliches out there, ‘lifestyle change’ has to be the most often abused and now completely meaningless one out there.

Starting on heroin is a ‘lifestyle change’. It can mean 7 billion different things to 7 billion different people.

I’m adopting a low carb approach at the minute so that I am less reliant on gels during ultramarathons. I am not doing it as a ‘lifestyle change’. I just don’t want to be sick like at the end of the Thames Path Challenge. If my body can utilise fat even at half the efficiency it uses carbs, that’s a victory to me. Gels become an optional supplement, not my brunch, lunch and main fucking course.

When I try these diets it is not all or nothing anymore. Why? Eating 200g of carbs and recording it is better than going back and eating like I usually do. 200g carbs is way better than a hopeless gangbang of Haribo and chocolate croissants. I can’t keep to strict low carb for very long. I’ve tried it in the past and I can last maybe a week before I’ve had enough. I don’t want to do it that way.

Setting myself up for modest success in the short term is way better than to fail epically. That’s how I’ve lost 8kg this year already. Small steps forward.

I’ve progressed to the point where I don’t have to lose weight anymore.

I’m experimenting now with the best ways to maintain weight.

I’m excited by lower carb and the idea of running off fat. I started running to lose fat. At some point in marathon training I managed to convince myself that I started running to eat as much as I wanted to. I don’t know how that happened. If jogging slowly on a low carb diet produces the ultimate conditions for fat loss then that’s the way I want to train at least for a while.

It means that if I have a bad week of eating in the office then at the weekend I can go out and run for half the day and strike a balance.

I’m not buying into a way of eating as a religion. For many people certain diets represent their last chance at a normal life and I can appreciate that but I can see it for what it really is. If I can eat lower carb for even a few months a year and it helps me as a runner, then I’d be a fucking fool not to at least try it for a while.

I ran 20 miles yesterday on zero carbs. That’s pretty promising (even if I had Skittles and a Biryani afterward).

The only lifestyle change that I give a fuck about is not drinking. It’s made all of this possible thanks to consistency. I give myself leeway with my eating to keep the drinking impulses at bay. The last thing I need to do is to fail at not-drinking and an ultra restrictive diet. That notion can go and fuck itself!

I’m 85.6kg today. That’s down from 93.6kg in January 2017. I was 93.6kg in this photo taken at the Country to Capital ultra.